This week I read an article called “Change by Design”. I really enjoyed reading this article, and it relates to what is going on in the marketing and design world today. People and or designers are using their design skills to solve problems today. There is a lot of opportunity for design right now.

Design activism builds on what exists already. Active design is describing how we are working towards being more sustainable. These two are different but achieve the same goal, which is to be more sustainable. I personally like design activism, because we have to come up with ideas to help what is already in place. We will see more of this in the future.

I am using a shirt for this example. The shirt was made in China. Human capital relates to people’s knowledge, skills, and health. I feel that the people that made this shirt had knowledge about the fabric they were using and had the skills to sew and create it. I know China is known for underpaying workers and having them work in horrible conditions. I assume their health was fair to bad. Natural capital relates to energy, resources, and materials that are used in the creation of the product. We use fabrics, chemicals, dyes, and lots of water in the process of creating clothing. I know China got in trouble because they were dumping chemicals into the water and polluting it. China could look into how to be more sustainable when producing clothing. They can’t dump chemicals into the water anymore. They could also increase the workers pay and treat them better. These are all ways we can make a change in the future.

Hunger is a huge problem in our world today. I see people every day around town asking for food and or money. I feel like our community in Tulsa does a good job helping each and every needy person. I work at a local boutique, and I feel like we could come up with something to help. A lot of places will have a food drive for a short amount of time. What if we all came together as a community for a longer amount of time. If customers brought a canned good or other food, they could get a discount. This would benefit each person, and I think it is a good idea.

My learning community and I had to come up with a sustainable Halloween party idea. We came up with making our own costumes from recycled clothing items. So many costumes that consumers buy every year get thrown away or forgotten about. This would help solve that problem. We also said we would have biodegradable plates, napkins, and cups. We also wanted to have edible utensils so they wouldn’t go to waste.

Maria Thiry came to our class to talk about textile sustainability topics. She works for AATCC. They are the largest non-profit professional association devoted to design, textile chemistry, and advanced fibrous materials. They have more than 2,600 members. She said there are student memberships, which are at a discounted price. She also said there are a lot of internships and job opportunities with them.